Today a friend visited me, so I seized the occasion to perform a hardware blind test. Computer blind test, like original vs MP3, I can do them alone with a program, but for real vinyl vs CD blind tests, I need someone to switch the source selector "in my back".

It was a "vinyl versus digital" test. A vinyl was playing back. The line out of the ampli was directed into the DAT deck, 48 kHz 16 bits. The ampli vinyl input (pure analog) was compared to the DAT input (digitized to 48 kHz 16 bits).

Preliminaries listening sessions : the digital sound seems more bright, shiny and detailed to me, the vinyl more smooth, silky and "noisy". The digital sound seems also "tiresome". No difference in frequencies or definition, just feelings.The voice seemed to be more separated to the instruments on the digital version to her, though there is quite no difference between the two versions.

Then, in turn, the operator writes down on a paper a serial of sources, digital or analog, that are going to be played. The subject must then write on his own paper the source that he thinks he is listening to, for each session. Then the results are compared. After the test the roles are inverted, the operator becomes subject, and the subject operator.

Results :Me :6/10, but I guessed 3 of them recognizing the level difference, the real result is then 3/7.Her :5/8. After 5 trials she said she couldn't concentrate. We stopped for 2 minutes, then I played the references again, and she said the feeling was opposite now : the voice seemed more detached in the analog version, and that she had probably inverted all previous answers. Anyway, noting 0 for false and 1 for true, she got0 0 0 1 1 -pause- 1 1 1 , so it's a failure whatever way we interpret the results.

Here's a sample of what we listened to, to illustrate the ability of digital to reproduce the "warm, fuzzy, fat, analog sound of vinyl".sandra.mpc 516 kB, 22 seconds

Speaking from a personal view i think nostalgia has a lot to do with it. Some of the remastered to cd songs just don't feel the same as you remember feeling them all them years ago. Music isn't just about clarity and frequencies.

Back in the 80's I used to listen to records and tapes on my mums music system. Revox turntable, Harman Kardon 1000watt solid state amp, marantz tape deck and speakers, not your average off the shelf midi. The system was able to give music a feeling that cheap consumer digital systems of today don't come close to, a music that filled all your senses and made your skin tingle (see how nostalgia creeps into memories hehe) ,but that doesn't mean the music was technically better, it was noisy and crackly, but that was half its charm

music these days is over processed and too clinical, hopefully one day they will combine the best elements of both :O)